Radley Private School holds Entrepreneurial Networking Event

A special networking event was held by the school to guide their young entrepreneurs.

Allon Raiz addresses attendees at the Entrepreneurial Networking Event. Photo: Lonwabo Sangqu

Radley Private School held a well-attended Entrepreneurial Networking Event on the evening of September 1.

The Ferndale-based school is known for its mission of developing young leaders and entrepreneurs for the future.

Grade 1 learner Kaycey Seward welcomed all guests as well as her fellow peers. The principal of the pre-primary and primary school Charné De Gouveia extended the welcome as she introduced the host for the evening Allon Raiz who is the founder and CEO of top business incubator Raizcorp as well as the owner of Radley Private School.

Grade 1 learner Kaycey Seward welcomes all guests to the school networking event. Photo: Lonwabo Sangqu

In his address to attendees, Raiz said, “Entrepreneurs are not born or made they precipitate. They precipitate under five conditions.”
The first was that all entrepreneurs had faced a crisis in their life or saw an opportunity or both happened at the same time. The second was pain tolerance. “This tolerance for pain story is interesting because for those entrepreneurs… 99.9% of all businesses die in your head. As you leave the shower they die. The ones that survive are when you go to your husband, wife, boyfriend or girlfriend and you say ‘Babe, I have an idea’, and then they say ‘No, that’s a bad idea’ and then it dies there.”

Pre-primary and primary school Charné de Gouveia introduces the guest speaker for the evening. Photo: Lonwabo Sangqu

He added the third was risk tolerance and the fourth was the belief in your abilities to muster resources.

Raiz said the fifth was that entrepreneurs who succeeded were the ones that learned how to iterate.

“There is more money chasing good ideas than are good ideas chasing money. South Africa is awash with cash looking for great ideas.”

Grade 9 learner Tristen Padarath said what he took away from the event was entrepreneurs who became successful were the ones that never gave up. “They fail, change and adapt but keep going. Knowing how to price your product correctly is vital,” said Tristen.

Grade 11 learner Cohen Wingrove said what he had learned had been that entrepreneurs needed to think about everything about the business and be ready to adapt plans and be flexible. “Successful entrepreneurs do not blindly stick to the original plan, they adjust and make changes and listen to the market,” said Cohen.

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